Ten After Midnight
by Hazelspice
Summary: Hazel is just a socially awkward, stressed out university student, with Sherlock Holmes tendencies. The night before her final paper is due, her apartment is broken into. She only wonders why, and how he managed to get that blue Police Box inside her bathroom.
1. A Funny Man and A Blue Box

**Ten past Midnight**

I cracked my knuckles while I let my computer shut down. One essay down, one more to go. But not tonight, I'm too tired tonight. I'll start the second in the morning, but right now, it's time for bed.

I was already in my Minnie Mouse pajamas and had my hair in a tiny pony tail, with my favourite black head band pushing it out of my face. Not the most attractive look, but I don't think Shakespeare would mind that I tore apart Romeo & Juliet, and Othello dressed that way. My thighs were still pink from the heat my laptop produced.

After my laptop was safely stashed under my bed, I got up to make my customary cup of tea (earl grey, drowned with honey) before bed. It was sickly sweet, but the honey felt good running down my throat and it helped calm my mind and allowed me to think of more trivial matters. Am I almost out of strawberry shampoo? I should stop by the Library soon, haven't been in a while. What television shows have I missed recently?

I finished my tea, dumped the excess honey down the drain and left my cup to soak in soapy water so it'll be easier to clean in the morning. I headed back to my bedroom, turned off the lights and snuggled down in my blankets for some well needed sleep. Just as I got in that perfectly comfortable position, I heard a strange whir noise from the bathroom. Damn, I thought, I left the ruddy fan on. I should turn it off what with bills being as high as they are.

I flipped the sheets off me (regretting it already, I'd never get that comfortable again) and got out of bed, the whirring noise stopped. Great. I lost my spot for nothing, I thought. But it wasn't nothing.

Not thirty seconds later did I hear a faint humming sound, and someone mumbling something to themselves. My survival instincts kicked in. Someone is in your house, phone the police and grab the nearest heavy object. No, I said to myself, it could just be the neighbour's television. But just to be safe…

I dug my baseball bat out of my closet, and started down the short hallway. I kept the lights off, I'd need every advantage I could get. I'm rather short, and not athletic in any way shape or form, and I was close to being underweight. In order for someone to get to my second floor flat, they'd had to have climbed up the fire escape which isn't easy.

A strange blue glow was leaking out from under the bathroom door. As I reached the door, I took a deep breath. Ok, you can do this, you have a rather heavy baseball bat, and have taken several self-defense courses. And what do they have? A humming blue flashlight? You can take'em.

I kicked through the door and swung the bat blindly, nearly breaking my mirror and hitting my target in the head. But he had ducked just in time.

"Woah there! You nearly took my head off!" The man standing in my bathroom exclaimed. He was a tall bloke, no more than 30 years old. He had strange hair that stood up at the ends and wore a navy blue suit with a red tie and matching red trainers, on top of that was a heavy brown trench coat.

What was stranger than the man's appearance was the blue Police Call Box, that now stood in my bathroom.

"Wh-who the hell are you? What the hell are you doing in my bathroom at midnight? And why the bloody hell are you wearing a trench coat in June?" I damn near shouted them at him. He had at least a foot on me in height. I guess I was trying to make myself appear bigger. I widened my stance and held the bat up high.

He raised his hands slowly. "My name is the Doctor. I don't know what I'm doing in your bathroom, I ended up here accidentally, and I am rather fond of this coat."

In his right hand was a small strange object. He must have seen me looking at it because he began to put it away. "What is that thing?" I barked at him. He stopped moving. "It's just a screwdriver. Please put your bat down, I do not wish to harm you."

"I'm not putting it down till I know why and how you're here." I was trying my best to stay in control. I guess I was succeeding because he looked scared.

"If you put the bat down, I can try to explain. I have no weapons on me, you can check if you'd like, but I am unarmed."

"Fine." I lowered my bat. He straightened his tie. There were some small beads of sweat on his forehead. I'm not sure if they were from nervousness or from the overwhelming heat of his trench coat.

He reached into his coat inside pocket. I raised my bat again. He flinched. "I'm just putting away my screwdriver." He put his so called screwdriver in his pocket and pulled out a blank piece of paper. Scrawled across the paper in messy writing were the words 'Help me please! I've done nothing wrong! Please someone, anyone! Please listen to me!' "I'm here because of this. I used my TARDIS to-"

"I'm sorry your what?"

"Oh my TARDIS. Time And Relative Dimension In Space. That's the blue box behind me," he said it with this big smile on his face, much like a five year old who knew the answer to a question his teacher asked.

"You're completely looney, you know that. Totally Bonkers."

"Yeah, I get that a lot. Well since you know I'm not here to harm you, and you no longer have a bat to my head, I think it's time we better got to know each other. I'm the Doctor, I travel in a TARDIS and respond to urgent messages I receive on pieces of paper. And you are?"

"I'm sorry I don't give my name out to mad men with funny hair who appear in my bathroom in their blue box at midnight."

"Alright then, moving on. Why I'm here. You haven't made this distress call have you? Maybe seen something strange or peculiar going on lately?"

"The only strange thing I've seen is this. I must be going mad! It's the stress of that damned literature course I'm telling you. I knew I shouldn't have taken it. Now I'm hallucinating! Funny men with Police boxes and trench coats and light up screw drivers in my bathroom! I need another cup of tea…"

"I'll go put on the kettle!" He said as he ran past me and down the hall.

"Are you sure I'm not just mad?" I asked staring blankly into my cup of untouched mint tea. The Doctor was already on his third cup.

"No you're not mad. Well you might be, I don't know you too well, hardly at all really, in fact I don't even know your name. You can tell a lot about a person from their name. Background, family life, history-"

"It's Hazel," I said flatly still staring into the steam of my mug, "Analyze that Sherlock."

"Hazel! Lovely name. Brilliant. You're a smart one aren't you? Study hard, very creative, yes…" He trailed off. I took the opportunity to try and sort out my thoughts.

"So you want me to believe that you Travel through time AND space in a tiny blue police box, and you came here by mistake because a piece of paper received a message that you tracked to my bathroom?"

He snapped back into focus. "Well you don't have to believe it if you don't want to. I help people, so when someone's in trouble I come running."

"Could've used you growing up," I mumbled into my cup of tea, finally taking a sip. "Well I'm sorry I can't be much more help to you than give you tea, and apparently give you biscuits," I said as he found my secret stash of jammie dodgers and grabbed a handful. "I'd show you the door but, it appears you have your own mode of transportation."

"Yes well, quite right, I shall be off then. Allons-y as I always say!"

"Not Allons-y. That's plural. I'm not going with you."

He opened his mouth as if to say something. He was quiet for a while, and his eyes had this far off look, as if remembering something. He closed his mouth, shoved his hands in the pocket of his trench coat and looked down. "yes, I suppose you're right. Well off I go then…"

He began this slow sad march back down the hall. He looked like a dog that had been kicked in the stomach. Damn, was I a sucker for wounded creatures.

"Well I suppose since you're going to be in the area, and it can get dangerous at this time of night, you'd need someone to protect you and make sure you don't get lost. And, well, you've seen me swing a bat…" I said lamely after him. He stopped and turned around. There was this big ear to ear grin on his face. He ran over and grabbed my hand.

"Oh you are Brilliant Hazel! Absolutely brilliant! You know that?"

"Yeah, yeah, sure. Just gimme a minute to change out of Minnie Mouse alright."

"Oh don't worry, there are plenty of extra clothes in the TARDIS."

"OI!" I yanked my hand out of his. "You expect me to get in that tiny box with you and strip down to me undies? No way in hell am I going with you now!"

I began to march away, but, like I said, he was bigger than me. He grabbed my hand and spun me around. "Well obviously I wouldn't look! It's a lot bigger than you think, honestly."

We continued down the hall to the bathroom. He snapped his fingers and the door of the TARDIS opened. He walked inside. I hesitated. He popped back out and gestured for me to follow. Slowly I stepped in. He was right. It was bigger than I thought. Much bigger.

"Well? What do you think?" He asked smiling at the shocked expression that, no doubt, was stuck to my face.

"How can all this fit into my tiny bathroom? There's barely any room for a tub, never mind whatever this is."

"Time Lord design," was all he said.

"I'd ask what that means but it probably involves some long and confusing explanation that would make me feel even more silly than my pajamas do."

"Fair enough. Now if you follow down that corridor to the right, make a left past the third door, two rights and take the stairs up and make a left, a left and a right and the fifth door on the right hand side should be the costume room. I hope."

I got lost a fair amount of times (was it three lefts or two lefts and a right?) but eventually I found it. I was not sure what I was expecting, but there were costumes and outfits from every time period all over the world! Kimonos, flapper dresses, poodle skirts, hoop skirts, even several pairs of Go-Go boots. After trying on several different outfits of varying points in time, I found something from my era. Just a simple shirt with the Union flag (it's only called the Jack when it's flown at sea), and a pair of jeans.

I got back to the main room and found the Doctor tinkering with some buttons and screens on, what I assume is, the control panel. He looked up at me with this big grin when he heard me enter as if he were proud of something. But when he saw me his big goofy grin faded into that far off look, like something was wrong.

"What? Is it my hair? Is it standing up on all ends?" I said stupidly trying to fix it.

"No," he said snapping back to attention and looking down again, "that shirt belonged to a friend of mine. Not sure how it got in the closet. Anyways, I found the location of the signal. Turns out, I was a few degrees off. And so was the message. The psychic paper translated it for us. But after figuring out the original language it was sent in, I tracked it back to its original point of origin. Rome, Italy."

"Rome is a few degrees off?!" I said flabbergasted.

"And I was a couple centuries off too. The message came from Ancient Rome to be precise."

"I thought we'd just be going down the street because someone was getting mugged, or arrested for something they didn't do, or I don't know! But Ancient Rome? I can't. I Can't! I have a class tomorrow, and a paper due on the filth of renaissance drama, and a presentation on the metamorphosis of cells, and a job interview at this tea shop down the street!"

"What part of time machine don't you understand? We could go to Ancient Rome, the third moon of Galzar, and watch Earth collapse in on itself and be back for your morning cup of tea! We can go anywhere you want in all of space and time Hazel."

"Please just give me a minute to process all this. My brain may work faster than most, but this, this is a LOT to take in."

"I was wondering why you haven't been asking so many questions. Like about the TARDIS, Time Lords, my Sonic screwdriver, psychic paper, Third moon of Galzar, Doctor W-"

"Alright, I get it. I'm a new interesting phenomenon to you. I don't ask questions. I've learned to hold my tongue and I've figured out how to get more information out of people by staying silent. I've got the whole Sherlock Holmes thing going on."

"Really now? Well what have you deduced from me then? Impress me." He challenged me with his arms wide open but the big goofy smile on his face.

"Well first off, you're a mad man with a big blue box, but that's an obvious one. Second, I think you had full intention of dropping by my flat first. You knew where the message came from because I read it in Latin first, then English second because it's psychic paper which generally implies it reads minds so it knows what I want to see. I digress though. You travel through Time and Space apparently, this shirt belongs to your friend but no one is here. She left or you were separated for some reason. Not used to travelling alone, you swung by my place in hopes of finding someone to travel with you. You found me. TARDIS, Time machine, Time lords, Lords of Time, their design. Time has the ability of cramming as much as possible into one second, just like this ship, cramming as many things as possible into one little box. Tell me you're not impressed. Doctor. Who."

He sat there stunned for a minute with a look of rage, excitement, and sadness spewed together on his face. I probably shouldn't have said anything. Damn it Hazel! Why would you ruin something like this? Your chance to see Ancient Rome, to get a more accurate portrayal of it, To prove to your professor that the Coliseum was also a stage for theatre and not just for bloody deaths. But it was too late now. Just apologize, and leave. That's all you can do.

"I-I'm sorry. I didn't mean to say that. Sometimes I-I just get a bit out of hand. I-I'll leave now."

I began to head towards the door, head hanging low from embarrassment and self-loathing. I didn't even notice the whirring sound start up. It's possible I stumbled (it would explain the bruise on my fore arm), but I didn't notice. By the time I got back up and reached the door, the whirring had stopped.

I was about to step out into my bathroom, expecting it to be in a state of total disrepair, when I noticed something strange. The events of this morning left me completely dazed and confused, and I might have just been hallucinating from exhaustion, but I was certain that the Pantheon was not in my bathroom. I was in Ancient Rome.

Looking around in total shock, I took in everything I was seeing. Vendors, milling about trying to sell their merchandise, civilians going to pray to their Gods asking for who knows what, beautiful horses hooked up to shining chariots, and a great deal of strapping (shirtless) gentlemen. If I had had any doubt that the Doctor was a time traveller, those thoughts were immediately eliminated.

The Doctor placed a hand on my shoulder. "Now Hazel, with a girl as brilliant as you, what would ever make you think I'd turn you away?" he stepped out of the TARDIS, and headed over to a vendor that appeared to be selling rugs of some kind.

After what felt like forever, I stepped out of the TARDIS, and into the busy street. I headed over to the Doctor and found him picking up some of the carpets and throwing them over his shoulders like a shawl.

"So tell me, where can I find the nearest bazaar? I'm trying to find a new vase with Hercules on it, I broke my other one. Don't tell the wife." The Doctor said to the vendor. I don't think he had understood since he only spoke Latin. To my surprise he answered in English. "I don't think you'll have to worry about me telling her, you just did." He laughed lightly, and the Doctor turned around to me.

"And what exactly did you break this time, Sparticus?" I said thinking fast on my feet.

"Nothing honey, let's go." He said turning me around. "You really are witty aren't you? Almost clever. But not as clever as me. I found something out that is very interesting. There's a bear baiting going on today at the coliseum."

"Yeah? What's so strange about that? Happens all the time they have a convict to be executed. Always thought it would be interesting to watch." I said. The Doctor gave me a strange look. "What? Everyone has a violent side. Even you."

"That's not the point. The point is there is a bear baiting today. But what's strange is the convict, is a woman."

We hurried to the coliseum (wow never thought I'd say that in my life) in order to try and sneak into where they keep the convicts before the match. There were guards all around the entrance, some with swords, some with spears. Either way, we were outnumbered and out-weaponed.

"You have a plan right? The only thing I can think of is pretending to be royalty but we don't exactly look the part now do we?" I said while we 'hid' beside a fruit stand a fair distance from the entrance.

"No I usually just make things up as I go along. However, your plan sounds like a great plan. Follow me, one of these stalls should be selling togas." He said grabbing my hand.

"But how exactly are we going to pay? I don't keep spare gold coins on me. Hell, I barely carry any coin on me!"

"No need to worry, I do happen to have some on me. You really should carry some kind of money on you for emergency sake."

"Or incase I go travelling with a crazy man in a suit." I mumbled under my breath. "What was that?" he said. "Nothing, it's toga time."

"Good afternoon Gentlemen. We are here to inspect the prisoner for today's bear-baiting," The Doctor said with a flourish of his hand.

"And who, exactly do you think you are?" The Guard said with a stupid but low and rough voice. He was taller than the Doctor and by far more muscular.

"Oi! How do you not know who this is? I'm telling you we never should've come here the people of this city have no respect for the Royalty of the expanding Empire!" I said with all the confidence I could muster.

"Now, now, dear," The Doctor said, "No need to get upset. This man is a guard and not a man of proper authority, he cannot be expected to know such things based purely on sight. My apologizes good sir, I am Sparticus of Bluebox and this is my wife Percisa of Bluebox. We would like to see if the prisoner is fit enough to have a fighting chance. Those ones are always more interesting as you know. If not we have special permission from the Emperor to keep them under watch at our palace and give them some training."

The guard looked at us dumbly, checking us both out. I couldn't decide if he was trying to decide if he could beat us in a fight or if we were liars. He must have decided we were telling the truth because he let us pass. "Seventh cell on the left is who will be fighting today, your majesties." He gave an awkward little bow before adding, "And this one will be interesting. Today's convict is a woman."

"A woman you say? By heavens what could she have done that would doom her to here, and not just make her a palace slave?" The Doctor asked turning around.

"Well, way I heard it, she was a slave. But she messed up real bad, broke her masters prized stone, and then tried to cover it up by stealing it. Her master says it was a Emerald, largest one he ever found. Took him 5 months to dig it out of the mine he had been digging. She messed up bad."

"Well, thank you for your time," The Doctor said as we turned to walk down the dark corridor of cells. "Something is not right about that stone. There's more to it than that. See Emeralds are not found in this region, they never are until the year 3458 when they are being genetically grown all over the place because the make great hyperenergy conductors for power hamster wheels. Also they don't crack by simply dropping them. No, it's more than that."

"Okay so knowing that, and also knowing that her master has been digging a mine and finding whatever it is for the past five months at least, we know there are plenty of them and they have probably been sold. Which means at least a couple wealthy people have whatever it is. Let's hope it's not dangerous."

"Knowing my luck, it is. 7! Here we are!" He said as we reached the cell. We peered inside. It was dark and hard to see anything. But as our eyes adjusted we could make out shapes; an unlit torch here, a pile of chains there, but eventually we were able to see a figure curled up in a ball of dirtied white fabric curled up in the far corner. "Hello," The Doctor said. There was a small shift in the figure, but that was the only response we got from the shape. "I'm the Doctor, and this is Hazel we're here to help. What's your name?" He said. There was a murmur but that was all. "What was that?" He said.

"Pomfreina. My name is Pomfreina. And I do not wish to talk. I am about to die, leave me be." The figure said without moving. Her voice echoed around the cell, without echoing anywhere else.

"Listen, we got your cry for help. We know you're innocent we want to save you so you won't die today. I will not allow it. Now come on, get up so we can get you out of here." I said. Something about her wasn't right, if she just called so desperately for help, why would she have given up so fast?

"I cried 5 weeks ago. You are late. I am beyond help. An innocent soul is sent to die today. And so it shall be." Her words were left hanging in the air. I could almost feel them on my skin.

"No one is too far gone. Now get off your bottom so we can rescu-"

"Hazel," The Doctor cut me off, "It's no use. If she doesn't want to be rescued there is nothing we can do."

"No. No I don't believe that. You have a screw driver or whatever, you can open the cage and the chains and we can get her out of here. I am not leaving her! I am not leaving anyone behind to die!" I was screaming and tears were streaming down my face. At that moment the Doctor closed his eyes and touched my temples.

I could feel something moving around my mind. A slow creeping but not a menacing creeping, like a snake just crawling enjoying the sun on his skin rather than hunting for his prey. Images started quickly popping into my mind's eye. This nights events, my literary paper, My flat, everything from today, the month, the year. The images were flying faster by.

I realized it was the Doctor in my head. And he was searching for something. I didn't know what until he found it. A younger me stood in front of me. I wasn't smiling, but I was happy I remembered. My Mum had gotten promoted that day and was making dinner for a change. My little brother, Casben, and I were never told what my father or my mother did, I figured out that my mum was a police officer and my dad was in the government. They never talked about work. Said it was too dangerous for my brother and me to know. And they said they weren't allowed to anyways. But I knew.

My parents were always away because of work, so I always made supper. And packed our lunches for school, and made sure we ate a big breakfast. Mum and Dad always left before we did. "Good bye sweety, take care of your brother. Make sure he does his homework and eats his lunch. Talk to the teacher if he's getting bullied, and call us if there's an emergency," it was like their mantra. Sometimes I wouldn't even hear it directly, it was left in a note on the counter. But always the same words. And I lived by them.

Anyways that evening, while my mum was cooking, I went to go finish up some homework. Science was particularly difficult for 8 year old me, and required my full attention. I sent Benny to go play with his trains while I memorized the planets. So it was Mercury, Neptune, Earth, Mars, Venus, Uranus, Saturn, Pluto, Jupiter? No, Pluto's the farthest, Venus is next to Earth I think. Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Uranus, Saturn, Jupiter, Pluto. Sounds almost right, what was that rhyme we learned? My Very Evil Microwave Just Served Us Nacho Plates. So I was completely off. Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto. There it was.

I was about to move onto the constellations when something smelled off. I took big wiff of air through my nose and knew what it was. Smoke. Something was on fire. I ran down to the kitchen knowing the most probable cause was my mother's cooking. The entire stove was engulfed in flames, and my mother was nowhere in sight. I ran back up stairs and found her getting changed in the bedroom. I yelled at her to get out of the house and call the fire department.

My survival instincts kicked in. I was only 8 but I knew where my brother would be better than my mother. She would've gotten lost, or try to put the flames out herself and been killed, so I had to send her out. I checked his room first, just to be sure he wasn't there. He liked to hide under his bed when he was scared. He wasn't there which was good. Next I checked the basement.

It was coolest, and father had set up all his tracks down there, so if he had continued to play with them he would've been there. I checked the laundry room down there, my father's office, furnace room, and the train room. Nowhere in sight. The fire was starting to spread rapidly, because when I looked up I could see the smoke and some flames leap through the cracks in the floor boards upstairs. It was mesmerizing and terrifying at the same time. But there was no time to lose.

The last place he would've been was the nursery. By the time I got there, it was almost completely engulfed. There was a thick cloud of smoke blocking my view but I could see him. Pressed close to the ground, because he knew smoke and heat rise. He was crawling slowly towards me. I shouted at him to get up, but just as he stood, a beam from the ceiling came crashing down and caught his leg. I ran over, arm over my mouth to block out some of the smoke. I grabbed his hands and tried to pull him free, but it only shifted the beam so it pressed down more on him. I moved over to his leg and tried to wiggle it free but it wasn't working, his foot was caught too. Using all the strength I had, I tried to lift the firey piece of wood that was trapping Benny. I could feel my hands and arms burning and blistering, but I was not going to leave him. Not like this. I heaved with all my might, but I was fading fast, the smoke was getting to me. Stinging my lungs, blurring my eyes, and my hands, god did they hurt.

I heaved one last try, but it didn't move. I wanted to get something that would make it easier to move, but I couldn't leave Benny. Not like this. I tried breaking off pieces of the beam, leaving me with charring splinters in my fingers. Suddenly there was a crash. The wall of the room started to fall in, and the floor was breaking away. I checked on Benny, he had passed out already because of the fumes. Good. It will hurt him less. He won't feel a thing. With tears streaming down my face I kissed his head, and turned away.

Suddenly I was somewhere else. A new world with orange skies and people in long funny robes. The word Gallifrey came up but I didn't know what it meant at first. It didn't take long for me to realize that it was the name of the planet and I was in the Doctor's head.

A younger version of the Doctor appeared. At least, he looked younger, about ten years old. He was holding the hand of an elderly woman. Who looked to be about 80 but was probably older than that. "Hurry along child, we don't want to be late." She chided dragging him faster down the street.

"But I don't want to go!" he said tugging at her arm.

"That's enough of that! It's about time that you went and met the…

The Doctor broke contact with me. "Well," he said, "That's, uhm, well, we best be going." He started to walk away.

"Sorry!" I called following after him. What is it about me that keeps messing everything up with him? I don't love him but it's rare to meet someone who thinks like me. For someone who is so proud of her intelligence, I sure can be stupid sometimes.

"We're not talking about it. We need to find that stone," he said as he walked quickly, stretching his long legs farther with each step. I felt like a pony trying to keep up with a Clydesdale. God was he tall.

"Don't you think maybe we should save her first? I mean she is sentenced to die in about an hour," I shouted after him, "And could you please slow down, track and field was never my forte."

"No time to lose! We have to find the stone, possibly plural, within the hour so we can save her!"

"Well wouldn't it help if we knew her master's name?" I shouted. This brought him to a halt. He turned on his heel and was quickly walking towards me, angrily. He got right up to my face and opened his mouth to say something. He shook his finger, like you see angry parents doing in cartoons, but he closed it into a fist and stomped instead. "Damn it you're right," he said running both hands through his hair. "Come on," he said grabbing my hand and dragging me back to the seventh cell on the left.

"Alrighty then, what was your masters name?" he asked Pomfreina. She still hadn't moved. It looked (and smelled) like she hadn't moved in 3 months. Yet her clothes remained clean.

"Why should I tell you?" she said without turning to look at us, yet her voice sounded like it was right in front of us. "So you can save me? That's it isn't it? You want to save me. Well I don't want to be saved, so save yourself the trouble."

I was tired of this. I didn't care that she didn't want to be saved. I wasn't going to leave her like I left my brother. There was more I could've done for him and there is more I can do for her. I grabbed the Doctor's sonic screwdriver, and held it to the lock. It made a high pitched whining sound and the lock blew in a shower of sparks. But I didn't care about the sparks, I'd felt burns before, fire didn't bother me.

I walked right into the cell and grabbed her by the shoulders. She didn't move or say anything. I hauled her up with more force than I expected out of me. She was a lot lighter than I thought she'd be. "Now listen here," I began to say, but I stopped. I turned her around and saw the reason she was so light.

She was only bone.

I dropped her. Well, what once was her. She was literally a skeleton now. I was shocked and didn't know how to react. I didn't scream. I did however curse at a considerably loud volume. The Doctor had joined me inside the cell by this point. He was looking her over, examining the bones for a cause of death or a recording device that was making her speak.

"Well that's just great. How the bloody hell, are we supposed to find this damn stone if she's fockin dead? This is unbelievable! I mean we come so close to rescuing her and and she's not even alive! All that talk of her dying in a couple of hours when she was dead the whole bloody time! For once I thought we could save someone, but nope. Dead. Dead Dead Dead Dead Dead! I mean how could she even be talking? How can they have that kind of technology that allows a corpse to respond to what we are saying? Do you think there was another Time Lord here and they're messing with things?"

"Can't be, all the Time Lords are dead. I'm the only one left." He said half listening, half searching the ground for something.

"Really? I'm just the biggest mess up today aren't I? God I'm so stupid! Uugh there isn't a sensitive bone in my body!" I said to the ceiling. The Doctor still wasn't listening. He was examining something. It looked like a pendant of some kind. "What is that?" I asked looking down for a better look.

"A necklace, it was around her neck. But doesn't that look a bit out of place?" He said holding it up to me.

"The chain work, looks almost alien. Like I've never seen it in history books, or anything from my time. But the stone. It's been polished from a rock tumbler, it's very smooth. But even better than that, it's green. Almost emerald in colour, wouldn't you say?"

"I would say that yes. And I know who we can talk to find out who her master was." He said grabbing my hand and dragging me out of the cell. We ran down the hall, me clutching his hand and the necklace.

We exited the dark hallway, and stepped into the sunlight outside. The guard was still standing there staring straight ahead at nothing. A crowd was starting to gather, it was almost time for the event.

"Doctor," I whispered, "Don't you think someone will realize that we were the last ones to see her, and then suddenly she's dead?"

"We'll worry about that later. Right now, we speak to the guard. Oi! You sir! Yes, I was wondering, who was her master? She was not inclined to tell us."

"Well, Uhm," The guard said taking his eyes off the air he was staring at, "I believe it was, Uhh, master Petriticus. Yeah, he's a wealthy bloke, not married, he has a lot of servants though. He's a treasure hunter they say. Gives each of his servants jewelry in place of payment. Course they usually sell it, mind you, or trade it for food, or clothes, or for an education for their kids-"

"Thank you very much Wilfred, we'll be off now." The Doctor said giving him a pat on the back, and walking off. I curtseyed as I walked by, and hurried to catch up to the Doctor. I cannot emphasize this emphasize this enough, his legs were as long as a giraffes neck. "Any second now a guard is going to go in and check on her, when you hear shouts, we run." He said to me from the side of his mouth.

"Oh god not again, I'm going to need a head start." Just then we heard shouting from the guards and people behind us. "Right then, off I go!" I bolted. It wasn't long before the Doctor came up beside me grabbed my hand and started dragging me along.


	2. A Mysterious Man and A Green Rock

**A Mysterious man, and a Green Rock**

We had been running for what felt like an hour. Even in a light breezy toga I was sweating like polar bear in Cuba. The Doctor had barely broken a sweat, while my lungs were fighting for breath. He must do a lot of running, which lead me to wonder if he always got into this sort of trouble. The answer to that was probably no, he got into far worse trouble than just this.

It was not fun being dragged along. It felt like the first time I ever water skied, with the boat tugging me along, and I tried to keep my balance and not fall over. Needless to say I didn't last long before my epic (and inevitable) wipe out. But this time there was no water to cushion me. Only a busy Roman street filled with vendors selling anything from fruit, to idols, homeless and poor begging for some extra coins, thieves and small children trying to figure out who would be the easiest to steal from.

When we felt we were far enough away from the coliseum and the angry mob, we slowed our hurried pace to one that I could actually breath steadily at. By asking a couple different vendors, we discovered that master Petriticus lived in a grand estate near the Pantheon. Great. All the way back where we started.

For no particular reason, the Doctor had an astounding knowledge of ancient Roman back streets, and we were there in no time. Obviously he'd been here before but how had he come to this time period and not caught even the slightest hint of something fowl?

We followed a hidden path up behind the Pantheon, to what was more than just a grand estate, it could've passed for Julius Caesar's palace. The place was massive. He must've devoted his life to digging up precious rocks.

We hiked up the hill and then up the many (many) steps to the palace. There were guards (much like the one at the coliseum) waiting by the door. This time we told them we were interested in purchasing some of their master's famous emeralds. They granted us entrance without hesitation.

"So, what business have two weary travellers, such as yourselves have in my humble home?" The master of the house asked, as he walked down a grand marble stair case in the front hall. He was not young, but not old, a fair age, probably late 30's to mid-40's. He sported the clothes of Roman noblemen, the formal wear specifically. Probably on his way to see his slave executed.

"We had heard magnificent things about this, grand palace, of yours. We had hoped to see it, along with this famous Emerald of yours that has been cause of such talk lately," the Doctor said. He had such a flourish with his words, it was no wonder he always got what he wanted. "I am Sparticus of the Roman colony Bluebox. This is my wife Percisa of Bluebox. She's a big fan of jewelry."

"Well I'm afraid you caught me at a rather inconvenient time, Lord and Lady of Bluebox. I am off to see an ex-slave of mine executed. She caused damage to this emerald of which you speak. I have some of the finest Jewelers in Rome appraising it to see if it can be repaired," he claimed, brushing us off.

"Well, when my husband here says I am a big fan of jewelry, he means that I am the daughter of a jeweler and spent many years as his apprentice. I have picked up a lot of skill at it, and am interested to see if I could fix your precious gem. I won't take too long. If you let me look at it, It would only take me, say 5 days to fix it, depending on how deep and long the crack is." I said quickly stumbling over some words. He didn't seem too convinced.

"Yes, of course that's what I meant. I just did not wish to show off my wife. Don't want another man stealing her eh?" The Doctor said with a laugh. Petriticus seemed to also find this funny, and gave a chuckle.

"Lord Sparticus, it would not be her skill that would tempt a man, but her fair beauty," he said coming down the stairs and kissing my hand. I blushed. The Doctor gave him an angry glance. I'm not sure if this was because he was playing the part or he actually didn't want someone to steal me away. "What could it hurt, I shall let you appraise my precious stone. It is the same colour as your eyes, fair lady."

"Now that's how you treat a woman," I whispered to the Doctor, "Not by breaking into her house. Or her mind for that matter."

"Hey, you got into my head too!" He whispered back harshly.

"Yeah, but I did not get half as much information from you, as you got from me!"

"Trust me, you don't want to see the rest."

Oh, but how I did.

The Master of the house took us down a hall and to a small room. The room was dark, but Petriticus lit a torch and dropped it ever so dramatically into a trough filled with oil that ran along all four walls of the room. He was more dramatic than the Doctor, and just as handsome. Shit did I just say that? I don't fancy the Doctor, I just, well he's attractive and that is an honest opinion. Nay, not opinion, fact. Oh forget I said anything.

The stone stood on a pillar in the middle of the room. It reflected the light of the fire, like a mirror, but it had a more rough-looking and dull exterior. It looked nothing like an emerald really, it had the colour of green quartz. It had a smooth surface but didn't sparkle, only reflected the light. It's hard to describe, but I knew it was not from this earth. Or at least, not originally.

"I am particularly proud of this one," Petriticus beamed as the Doctor and I stepped closer to the rock, "Dug it out myself. All my shovels had broken, so I was using my hands to claw at the grimy stone and dirt that was around it. Took me five long hard months. My hands still haven't fully recovered. Every time I wash them, a little bit more dirt comes off-"

"My Lord, I'd love to hear this trying tale of yours," I said, interrupting his monologue, "but the Doc- I mean Sparticus, and I prefer to work in peace and quiet. Would you also be so kind as to leave us with the stone for a while? Just so we can get a better, reading if you will, of it's condition." I put as much flirt in this line as possible, batting my eyes and leaning my hip to one side. It felt awkward but it must have worked since he left.

I touched the stone with my index finger, and it felt warm underneath the slight pressure. The Doctor was circling it, like a shark before a frenzy. I found the crack, short but it ran from the top to no more than one eighth of the stone. At a closer glance, I noticed some even smaller, barely noticeable cracks around the main crack. The pattern the cracks made reminded me of something, but I couldn't put my finger on what.

Suddenly, the Doctor swooped in on his prey. He gently felt the sides of the stone, being careful not to touch the crack. And, for what appeared to be no reason, he licked it. He tasted the surface on his tongue making some clucking noises, then shivered. Obviously it tasted unpleasant, it was a rock.

"So, all-knowing Time Lord, how does today's dish taste?" I asked, every syllable coated with sass. He stood there staring off into nothing, muttering to himself, and occasionally clucking at the taste again.

"Ash. Ash and Dirt. Today's dish is ash and dirt. That's what I've found, what have you discovered?" He asked challenging me.

"Well, first appearance: Not Emerald, but we ruled that out already. Second appearance: Not of this world, again already determined. But we never determined why really. Other than being able to communicate between the dead and the living, we can now see that the light from the fire reflects off of it, but the surface is not anywhere near shiny enough for that to actually happen. When I touched it, it got warmer beneath my finger, it produces its own heat which means it could be alive. The crack, at first glance seems like a normal dropped it kind of crack but if you look closely, and I mean really closely, you can see this strange pattern of tinier cracks, which look exactly like that of cracking an egg. It's an egg and whatever is inside is ready to come out."

"Well do you have a better idea?" I snapped at the Doctor in a harsh whisper, "We need some way of getting this egg out of here, and we already know he fancies me. A little more flirting won't hurt, especially if it can get that egg out of here."

"Well what if it doesn't get the egg out of here?" He replied nervously.

"Oh so you have no confidence in my abilities to flirt, is that it? Or is it something else? Maybe you don't want me flirting with him because-"

"Because what?" He said cutting me off.

"Because you'd be jealous!" That stopped him for a while, but not too long. But I caught something in his eye, and I knew what it was. "But something like this has happened before. They left you or almost left you for someone they met on a trip. And you can't handle something so suddenly being taken away from you again."

He was not crying but he appeared to be remembering the feel of tears in his eyes. All the times he cried over the things he lost, the people he's lost. And I could see there was a lot of them.

No, wait, I could actually see them. All of them. Faces and things were flying by, all a blur, but all distinct. A girl no older than 20 being sucked away into a void, then saved at the last minute, A med student, simply walking away from him, A woman in a white dress, who he barely knew. His granddaughter. And there were face changes too. New faces flew by, all of them men, all of them him. All the people he barely knew but watched die-

And they were gone. Just as fast as they came. I had been inside his mind again, but I didn't know how. Shit. If I hadn't messed things up before they were messed up now. He'd probably just take me back to the TARDIS now, and drop me back in my bathroom. No use apologizing.

"I'm sorry," I said. I was so bad at not apologizing; you'd swear I was Canadian or something.

"How did you do that?" was all he said. But I could see the look in his eyes had changed. It was no more sadness but wonder and curiosity. I had again proven I was a new and interesting puzzle for him to solve. "We weren't even touching, how could you have done that?"

I didn't answer since he seemed to be asking himself that question and not me. "There is something much more to you than even you know, Hazel, my brilliant, clever Hazel." The way he said clever sounded foreign to him, like he'd never used it to describe someone other than himself.

"Um, thank you," was all I said, and I said it as quietly and mouse-like as possible. I was never clever, hardly ever brilliant, mostly just intelligent or smart. But something about how he said it this time, made me actually believe it. I was more than smart. I was clever.

"Anyways, the plan. No, you shan't flirt with him, too risky. If you fail, our cover is blown and he'd know we want the stone-"

"But if it works, we have the stone for as long as we need, and we wouldn't be stealing it like you plan on doing."

"You're not taking my stone," Lord Petriticus boomed as he stood in the door way.


	3. A Servant Girl with Golden Locks

**A Servant Girl with Golden Locks**

I looked at the Doctor, and he at me. Crap. Now what? Obviously my plan would not work too well, he was blocking our entrance and heard everything we said. We could try to push past him but he had who knows how many guards, we'd never make it. The best solution (or maybe the worst) was to explain what exactly was going on.

We started from the beginning. How we came from another time, and went to visit Pomfreina and discovered she was already dead. We showed him the necklace and said her spirit was communicating through it, and we needed to figure out what the rock actually was. We told him it was an egg from another planet, but we didn't know which one yet, and we wouldn't know until we could run some tests. We told him lives could be at stake if we didn't find out if it was deadly or not.

He stared at us blankly at first. His expression slowly changed to shock, but then it quickly changed to the expression I had feared the most. Rage.

"How dare you come into MY house, lie to ME and then attempt to steal MY stone! What do you take me for? A fool? I shall have you punished! Executed! You won't even have the chance to fight for your lives like that winy, useless, klutz of a servant girl-"

I don't know why I did it, but I did. I pushed him out of the door way, and suddenly I was kissing him. I had no other reason to do so other than to buy the Doctor some time. I reached out as best as I could with my mind screaming for him to go. I didn't even know if that would work, but shortly he was bolting out the door, the egg clutched tightly under his arm.

The kiss was gross. Like it was slobbery, and weird and felt wrong. But the second the Doctor was out of sight, I let go of him, finishing the kiss and beginning to run myself. But the kiss had lasted too long. The master of the house had managed to shake off the surprise of this sudden kiss. The second I got off him to start to run, he had grabbed my wrist. The next thing I knew, there was a hand meeting my face, and me meeting the floor.

* * *

The Doctor neared the TARDIS, egg still under his arm, still running. He never stopped running. He snapped his fingers and the door opened, and he bolted inside. He placed the egg down on the console and began pressing buttons. He needed to find the planet or species that the egg belonged to. And fast before it hatched. After a while he heard the door close behind him.

"AH, Hazel, I never should've doubted you, you clever, clever girl," He said still pressing buttons, "Moves like that don't usually turn out to well for me. I'm good at making things up as I go along, but my companions are usually not the best at first. Well what are you standing by the door for? We've got a lot of buttons to press and I can't-"

He turned around and stopped. Horrified. There was no one else in the TARDIS with him. Hazel, didn't make it back.

The thought hit him hard. "NO!" he screamed slamming his fist into the console. "NO! THIS WAS NOT SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN! EVERYTHING WAS SUPPOSED TO WORK OUT! FOR ONCE CAN THINGS JUST WORK OUT PLEASE!" he was pulling at his hair, there were almost tears in his eyes. But no, he would not cry, she was not gone yet. He could still save her. She still had a chance.

He hooked the egg up to the TARDIS scanner, and set it to run all tests. Species, planet, galaxy, origin, diet, life span, everything he could about this blasted thing.

While the TARDIS searched, and ran it's scans he started heading to the hallway. But was stopped when he noticed something, something blocking his path. Hazel's, well, her borrowed, clothes. He picked them up, but they felt heavier than they should have. After checking the pockets, he found the source of the weight. A Rust covered pocket watch_. Now why would she have that?_ He wondered.

He remembered seeing something about a pocket watch in her memory, but those two were silver and shining, no way could they have rusted this much in that time. He set the watch on the console, and returned the clothes to the wardrobe room. He walked back the way he came for a bit, then made three rights, two lefts, slid down a fire pole, made another left and entered a room he had never used.

The TCR, Telepathic Communications Room, not as good an acronym as TARDIS but, it worked. The room was designed by the TARDIS as a communication between Time Lords, and just magnified the telepathic field of the Time Lord using it. Other nearby TARDIS's would pick up messages, or any psychic paper would receive them. Like a galaxy wide email service.

The Doctor entered the bright white room, and climbed the stairs leading to the control panel. He set the field to 25% magnification. He didn't want anyone from the Time Agency picking up the message. He didn't even know if this would work but he had to try.

He placed a helmet on his head, and thought one word. Hazel. He thought of the word over and over again. He got no reply. He turned it up to 35%, and tried again. Hazel. 45%. Hazel. 55%. Hazel. 75%. Hazel. 90%. Hazel. 100%. Hazel.

He could feel the pressure the telepathic field was creating. If he went any higher, surely his head would explode and the regeneration would start again. And he was getting no response. It was useless. But still he left the field up at 100% increase in case something did come through.

He headed back to the control room, to see what the TARDIS had found out. As he climbed the small set of stairs, something on the control panel caught his eye. It was shiny, and small, and silver. At first it looked like just a button or nob, maybe even a doodad, but upon further inspection, it turned out to be the stop watch.

The telepathic field must have shook it around a bit causing it to self-polish, the Doctor thought. He rubbed at it a little bit more, and the rust fell away without any problems. He grabbed a cloth and began to rub the rest away. He didn't even notice the TARDIS printing something.

As he rubbed away, and the bits of rust fell, the stop watch began to shine a bit more, until almost all the rust was gone. Before he got the last major chunk off, the scanner buzzed to alert him it was complete. He dropped the stop watch in surprise, picked it up, placed it back on the panel, and began to walk over to the screen. _Oh no_, he thought, _this is much worse than I expected_.

* * *

It was dark. Yeah, that's all I got. No wait, I lied. It was dark AND cold. Wait again! It's rocky, and hard and Something smells like it's been dying for a hundred years but is not yet dead. There was something dripping off in the distance.

My eyes didn't adjust as quickly as I hoped, but I figured I was underground, in a cave or dungeon or something. I checked myself to make sure I was ok. A bit dirty, my cheek hurt, so did my hip from the fall. I was probably dragged down here which would explain the torn ends of my dress and scratched ankles. It felt like sand paper had been rubbed over them.

I attempted to stand, but I could not find a wall near enough to lean on for support. I was not sure how sturdy my ankles were. I picked a direction and crawled, hoping I'd bump into something eventually. And I did. But not what I had hoped.

I couldn't decide if I had reached bones, or broom handles. My bet was on bones. And there were lots of them. Of all sizes, meaning multiple skeletons, all covered in rags, which meant they had been here a long time and/or they were slaves. And something else.

I had managed to find a wall and stand up, and by that time my eyes had adjusted a little bit. I could make out the outline of the skeletons, and some small almost glowing lights inside all of them.

"Shit," I whispered to myself, as I bent down to look at the tiny lights.

"What do you want?" A voice said from nowhere, "I have to get back to work, or my children don't eat tonight."

"At least you have children," another voice spoke more distantly, "I don't even have a home. This is where I sleep. This here, pile of dirt."

"Oi! SHUT UP THE LOT OF YOU AND GET BACK TO WORK!"

And then there was silence. I was alone, but I know where those voices came from. All the skeletons had tiny green gems around their necks.

I snatched the stone off the spine of the skeleton. And the next one, and the one after that too. I grabbed as many as I could, and noticed they each had a slightly different shade of green, and was different size. The size of the bones seemed to correspond with the size of the stone. Bigger stones, bigger bones. Bigger stones also had a darker green.

Bigger people, bigger and darker stones. There had to be a relationship, but how? The Doctor would know. But the Doctor isn't here is he? You told him to run, and he did. Hopefully he figured something out. No use complaining, I should be of some use and figure something out myself.

So the stones allow the dead to talk, which is creepy. Creepy aside, how? How can they talk through the stones? Or maybe the stones are talking for them. It seems impossible, but then again, I have seen the impossible today. I mean I kissed a man for no apparent reason, that is impossible.

I digress, so the stones speak for the people, but that is the how. How can a stone hold someone's thoughts, memories and even their voice? They are worn as necklaces, and seen as valuable, I would never take mine off if I had one and I were a slave. The stones must be absorbing their thoughts that way. Possibly all their energy as well, which is why the bigger bones have bigger stones! They absorb more energy because larger people can produce more energy!

And they're not even stones are they? They're eggs. SO whatever is inside them is absorbing people's energy so it can grow, and hatch and become…what? Something dangerous if it's killing people.

"You should bury them, or stomp on the ones you have, so they can't grow anymore," I said. But I didn't move my mouth. It was then that I noticed the precious jewel around my own neck.

* * *

"NO NO NO!" The Doctor screamed, "NO! That can't be right! How can they get here!" He made the scanner, check and re-check itself. All it said was the same thing over and over. It was an egg from Maggebar.

The Doctor scrambled around the TARDIS's control panel trying to figure out a way to locate Hazel. He did a scan for Time Energy, but the large quantity of eggs was throwing off the signal. He tried to figure out specific things he knew about the Maggebarians that could help him narrow down the signal.

They were from the Quazalm Sector of the Trixo Galaxy. They fed off of energy of all kinds, and that is how the eggs grow. Psychic energy, physical energy, and most of all Time energy. They were empty bodies that needed "souls" to give them life, the "soul" being absorbing an already living things energies, so it can take its place. Except with a much more demonic purpose.

They need more than one life to grow large enough to hatch. The one Petriticus had had taken 5 months to dig out, that's a lot of energy, and a lot of people. No wonder it was at hatching point. All it would need is for someone to spend a bit more time around it…

The Doctor was hit with a sudden realization. _How can I have been so stupid, when I am so clever? _He thought, _I took it into the TARDIS with ME at hatching point! But I need to figure out how to stop it first, before I can even think about letting it back out._

"Alright," He thought out loud, "It comes to a planet, absorbs all the energy, hatches, spawns until the planet is destroyed. Then moves onto the next, and repeats. But how do I stop it? How? Massive energy overload? Too risky, might just make it stronger. Can't smash the egg, too strong a shell. WHY CAN'T I THINK CLEARLY!"

In all his mental chaos, the Doctor didn't notice the small rattling on the panel. But now he did. It was Hazel's stop watch, the last little bit of rust had fallen off and it was now bright and new. And the Doctor recognized the strange engravings that had been covered in rust. They read 'Omega' only in circular Gallifreyan.

* * *

I snapped the necklace off my neck. "Ouch, that hurt" the stone said. It wasn't even touching me anymore, how is it doing that?

"Hello?" a high voice called from somewhere down the tunnel. I ignored it, but it wasn't long till I heard footsteps along with another call. "Hello?"

"Yes, hello!" I cried eagerly, "Is someone there? Like an actual human and not a skeleton?"

The footsteps pace quickened, followed by panting breath and the jingling of jewelry. A young girl of about 16 appeared in the darkness, dressed in white silks, and heavily clad with bracelets, necklaces and head pieces.

"It's good to see I am not alone," the young woman said, "I thought I had gone mad. Skeletons talking? That was stuff of myths, I must have been insane. I am being rude, I would introduce myself except I cannot remember my name."

"That's alright, I'm Hazel. I have no idea where I am, I was put down here only a couple hours ago. I think. But no you are not insane, however the bones are talking. Well, not the bones really, more of just the little green necklaces."

"I noticed those. Everyone seems to have them, they are not something I have seen before. I have seen many things, but not talking stones," she said in a very wispy voice. I started feeling a bit woozy, so I leaned against the wall.

"Trust me, neither have I until today. I think this tunnel is making me sick, or the pressure, or something. We should try to find an exit, or at least an air hole."

* * *

The Doctor was confused, shocked and excited at the same time. Another Time Lord! And he had been travelling with her the whole time! No wonder she could get into his head! It all made sense now!

He tried opening the watch, to give her back her memories. Or at least enough to locate her, but it was stuck. The watch wouldn't open. For once, the Doctor didn't understand, why wouldn't it open? It should open! It was cleaned up and everything. Except he realized what he was forgetting. This was her brother's watch, not Hazel's. Her brother was secretly a Time Lord, and she didn't know it. He died as a human, so his watch can't be opened.

Before he lost all hope he remembered again. Her memory. Hazel's memory. Her mother saved two stop watches. One of them was this one, and the other one… was missing. It was not here. But it was Hazel's.

But that means her parents could have been Time Lords too, or companions who had to keep the watches. There were so many possibilities! But Hazel, was at some point a Time Lord. And the Doctor, was not alone.

With his hope restored, the Doctor had a brilliant idea. Even though it was not Hazel's, this pocket watch was something she kept very close to her, and thought about a lot. Since even just the faintest thought of it is sitting somewhere in her head, she can be located.

The Doctor, wasting no more time, ran back to the TCR. Instead of hooking it up to his own mind, he hooked it up to the pocket watch. _This may not work but it's worth a shot,_ The Doctor thought, _Come on old girl, please work._

* * *

We kept walking down the tunnel for a long way. Every step hurt my head a little bit more. Thinking it was the stone, I tried breaking it but to no avail. I buried it, along with the others, but that probably wasn't any good since that's where the stones started. I kept walking, looking for some kind of escape.

"It's no use," the girl said, "We've been walking for hours, and have seen nothing. You do not look so good my friend, please rest a while. Just sit, for a bit. My feet are tired as well."

"No, I shouldn't sit," I began, but my knee gave out underneath me and I fell. "Alright then, I'll sit. We need to continue on though, sitting gets us nowhere closer to leaving. All I really need is some fresh air."

She helped me over to the cave wall. As I was slumped over, my head was pounding and spinning in a dizzying whir. Sitting down was not helping, but standing and moving seemed like an impossible feat. I lay there with my eyes closed breathing heavily, but I did not hear any breathing next to me.

I didn't have time to give it much thought, when I sudden headache took over. But this was not like the pounding from being underground too long, this was a new pounding, I knew this pounding. Quickly, what I was seeing changed. Not the back of my eyelids anymore, but a school yard. My school yard, from when I was young. My little brother was playing on the swings, and I was doing my homework on a bench nearby. I looked up in time to see him fall off, and start crying. He screamed my name as a small trickle of blood ran down his knee.

I knew what happened next but the image changed. There were sirens and alarms going off. I was in some kind of ship, that looked similar to the TARDIS. Four people were standing around, screaming, panicking, pressing seemingly random buttons, trying to fix whatever was wrong. "It's no use!" a woman shouted, "They're coming in too fast! You have to change if you want to live!"

Scene change. I was on the TARDIS. "Hazel" came through to me. "Hazel, can you hear me? Hazel, are you alright? Please, for the love of the seven moons of Gajit please be alright, Hazel." It was the Doctor's voice.

* * *

"- Fine," was all the Doctor heard. But that was enough. She was alive, he could communicate with her again, he could find her. That's all he needed.

"Hazel, I need you to listen to me. I need you to tell me about what's around you. Anything will help. Rocks, trees, grass, water, anything no matter how vague the detail. Be careful of the stones though if there are any. I'll tell you more when I see you but they are sucking energy."

There was silence for a bit, but faintly the Doctor heard a small reply.

"-'s mines. -ground, - little air. - dizzy, - sitting. - someone - here too. Young girl- please hurry."

It was broken, some words were missing but he received enough. Hazel was hurt, but not alone. Which made it worse, already he knew Hazel was in more danger than she thought. He couldn't tell her though, he had to get her out first, even if it meant the Maggebarian too.

"Alright Hazel, the TARDIS pulled up a map of the tunnels. I can see you. You're not too far from the surface. I need you to stand up, I know it hurts, but I need you out. Keep walking straight, and take the left most tunnel. There's three of them there, stay farthest left. Keep taking left until I tell you alright? There's my girl, keep moving."

* * *

It was painful, my everything ached, my head was spinning and if I had had anything in my stomach I can guarantee it would've been on the floor. But I kept moving because the Doctor told me too. Why was I following him so blindly? Right now because he was my only hope, but everything today. Whatever, shouldn't think, it was starting to hurt too much.

We kept left until a voice in my head said to go through the next middle tunnel then take two rights. And that's what I did. I stumbled down the middle tunnel and took the two rights. It took much longer than I'm narrating it to be, but in the interest of keeping your interest I'm speeding it up.

After a couple more rights, a left, 3 middles and a right, we finally saw light at the end of the tunnel. I had never been so happy to see the sun. On a normal day I would shy away from sunlight, social interaction and anything that wasn't the internet, tea and a good book, but today I embraced it.

I fell to the ground trying to catch my breath, and steady the turning earth beneath my feet. The girl walked up behind me and touched my shoulder sending a wave of pain up my spine. Why was everything hurting so much? This was more than just being under oxygenated. Can't think clear enough to figure out what though.

_I'm out. I see the sun and the ground and trees,_ I thought. Well, I might've spoken it, I can't know I was still spinning. I heard running steps and voices muttering behind me, and thought the Doctor was here to get me and take me home. That's all I wanted at that moment. To go home, get tucked into bed with a cup of tea and just hand in my damn essay the next day. I never asked for this, and I was tired and felt _weak_. More weak than I had ever felt in my entire life. Not even on the day my house burnt down.

"How in the name of Jupiter did you manage to get out?" Just my luck. Master douche-nozzle was here. For the first time since leaving the cave I stood up. The world spun in 5 different directions but I stood my ground. I could not see straight but I looked him in the eye. She came up behind me again and rested a hand on my shoulder to stop me from falling. I would've appreciated it more if every inch of me wasn't in pain.

"The Doctor… Saves… Lives… He could… save… yours too… if you only… let him…" Every word took effort.

"You stay away from me. Stay far away from my palace, from this city, from everything I have worked for. How dare you come back here! And you, servant girl, I left you for dead. How on the sword Mars did you survive?" He had fear in his eyes when he looked at her. She let go of me, and walked over to him with a powerful stride. He took small steps back, not wanting to be near her but not wanting to lose face.

"Like this," she hissed at him. Her hand reached out and grabbed his neck. The next sight was horrifying. Faster than her arm had moved, the man who once stood where Master Petriticus had stood, was only a pile of bones. His muscle and flesh and everything that was once him, was sucked into his bones. She stood there looking like she had just gotten back from the spa.

"You seem scared. Never seen an alien before? Well obviously you have, that Doctor friend of yours," she chuckled at that, "Where is he now though? Not here to save you. Looks like he doesn't save lives like you so strongly hoped." She started walking towards me, I called out with my mind _Doctor, please come quick I'm at Petriticus's Manor. Help me please!_

"Oh please, don't bother with that. I can hear everything you say. Now you were a lovely snack while I was trying to get out of that damn tunnel, but now I'm out and I think it's time I finished my meal." She jumped towards me. I used every ounce of energy I had left to step aside. She missed but just by a centimeter.

I tried to run, but fell. OH COME ON! WHY NOW NOT NOW! NOT WHEN I NEED TO RUN THE MOST! I rolled over and saw her standing above me. I had seen what she had done to Petriticus, and knew that's exactly what she had planned for me. I was trapped. This was my end. I figured when it was my time it would be some stupid way like, falling down the stairs or electrocuting myself with a toaster. This was by far, cooler but I was not done yet. I had more to do.

She reached down for my neck, and I closed my eyes accepting my fate. That last thing I felt was a warm hand close around my throat.


	4. Alternate Ending 1

Oh shit. Sorry. You probably thought I was dead didn't you? Sorry about that, guess that was a bad place to put a chapter break. Umm shit. Please don't hate me, not dead, still alive. There's still more to my story. If I had died how would I have been able to write all this down? You guys are just being silly, but sorry about that confusion. Didn't mean it. Sorry for any tears I may have caused by my appearance of death. Sorry.

Where was I though? Yes she had touched my neck, near death, watched Petriticus, well you know…

* * *

But suddenly the hand was gone. I opened my eyes, to the clear blue sky. This must be heaven, I thought to myself. I'm dead, and I've gone to heaven. That's strange, I was convinced I'd be going to hell in several different religions. Better than nothing I suppose.

I could feel I already had my robes, I was probably waiting to get my halo and wings. Then I could fly, maybe do the whole "Angel of the Lord" shit and defeat some demons, become a hunter like in that TV show…

But wait, why was I moving? I kept catching glimpses of trees out of the corner of my eye. Was I actually still alive? Okay, ears. You got them, let's use them. I closed my eyes again and listened really closely. There was sound. There was sound! I was still alive! I heard horse hooves, and merchants shouting about their goods, and someone panting and soldiers marching! God never was I ever so happy to hear that!

Someone was panting. Why did I pick that one out? I moved my head slightly and felt dizzy again. Alright shouldn't do that, let's not move. Just feel. Close your eyes and feel.

I felt arms around my back and legs. I was being carried. Good, yes, I suppose. Unless I'm being kidnapped, not good, no. But then I heard something, that was off, something that was not normal. I could hear the heartbeat of whoever was carrying me. But it was not one beat. There were two alternating beats. That was definitely not human. Which could only mean one thing.

I heard a door open, and feet on a metal grate. Soon I was being laid down on the floor. I opened my eyes again, and saw the Doctor looking down at me with concern on his face but relief in his eyes.

"I… I told… her… you… saved… people…" I managed to squeak out. I couldn't say much else, so I just smiled as best as I could. He smiled back with a little chuckle of relief. I felt so small just lying there, like a child again. _I'm so tired._ I thought to myself. I did not expect a reply,_ I know. _he said, well, thought. _You can't sleep, I need you to promise me that. Don't sleep._

"OK" I said but the rest was dark.

* * *

The Doctor started scrambling around the TARDIS's console again. The girl lying on the floor hardly looked more than skin and bones. Her joints protruding at seemingly strange angles, each rib could be counted, her organs appeared to have evaporated, her short hair clung lifelessly to her scalp that was almost her skull.

A wave of relief had washed over him, when he had seen her still alive, but looking at her now he knew he had just barely saved her. He had come just as he saw her bending down to touch her. The touch of death. The touch that was going to suck every drop of energy out of her, but he managed to stop it.

He had run over just in time, and scrambled her thoughts with his sonic just enough to push her out of his way, and get to Hazel. He took her pulse gently and knew she was still alive, so he could spend a small amount of time dealing with the Maggebarian. He tied her to a tree and hit her with another blast from the sonic, but he knew that wouldn't last too long. He lifted Hazel gently in his arms, and started running as fast as he dared.

He was in the TARDIS now, and she was safe, not for very long, but for now. Part of him wanted to share his time energy with her so she can heal faster, but he knew she was still human and it could kill her. He was not willing to take that risk.

He ran to the kitchen room and found some honey, and tea. She was from London, of course this would help. He ran back and fed her small amounts of honey, so she could start getting her energy back. He left the tea beside her so she could just smell it and feel the warmth from the cup.

"Hazel, I know right now you're not well but I'm going to tell you what happened. That girl who was with you was the first of the eggs to hatch. She was probably left to die in the tunnel and a hatched egg found her. She had been trying to escape since. That could've been months ago. When you came along she was just planning on killing you right away, but I had sent out my thoughts to you and she used that. Those eggs absorb energy of all kinds. The TARDIS and me are full of energy, so I've placed the egg in a concrete box. While it is still just a ball of energy looking for a host, that should stop it. But not for long. I'm looking for a permanent way to stop them right now. I'm so sorry Hazel, I should not have let you do that. How stupid could I have been? I'm so sorry."

And the Doctor started crying. Hazel didn't know why he was. She did not know he almost lost the only other person that is like him. She did not know what she was, and she wasn't even 100% sure what he was. Seeing him cry though gave her enough strength to stand up. She managed to walk over to him and wipe it away.

Seeing him cry like that was more painful than her physical injuries. Because something she did know, was the Doctor had lost before. He had lost many more than she could even imagine. She knew the pain of watching her brother die and knowing she could do nothing more than send him on his way peacefully. But even more she knew that Doctor had done that a thousand times more.

For the first time, his 900 years really showed, and she knew life was more painful and harder than death. And she wondered why he did it. Why he kept living and losing everyone he loved when it would have been easier to die.

* * *

She was in his memories again. She watched the 8 year old Doctor walk forward towards the Gallifreyan elders. They directed him up the steps where the mighty untempered schism stood. And she watched from above as he looked into it.

Tears were rolling down his face, as he looked on into the void of time and space. She knew he was slowly going a bit mad, and he wanted to run, but something kept him looking on. She figured out what it was just as the young boy turned and ran. And he didn't stop running.

* * *

"Sorry-" I creaked out sitting down again against the railings. He walked over to me, no more tears, not even the hint that he had been crying. He spooned some more honey into my mouth and gave me some water.

"No," he spoke to me gently, "Don't be sorry. You've helped me so much. Thank you. Sometimes, I need to remember why I'm still here."

He got up and started pressing buttons again. The TARDIS door must have been left open a crack because from nowhere there was a sudden burst of screaming. The Doctor ran over and peered outside. He ran back to the control panel and started pressing things.

"Right then, so your friend seems to have escaped and is now terrorizing Rome. People are dropping dead left, right, and centre and I still don't know how to stop it. Alright, conduct energy, we could use rubber but this is ancient Rome there is no rubber and won't be for another Century. My shoes, yes but I cannot encase her in my shoes. OH come on think! AHHHH" he screamed at himself as he ran his fingers through his hair.

I spooned some more honey into my mouth, and noticed something that had not been there before. On the control panel sat a pocket watch. My pocket watch. It was clean now and not coated in rust. I walked over to it, and looked at the strange symbols on it. They were familiar to me in a strange and eerie way. I took out mine and found similar markings on it. But mine was different.

I remembered where I had seen them before. Inside the Doctor's memory, all around the Schism were markings just like these ones. Even in my weakened state it took me no time to put the pieces together. All these strange quirks, my fast thought process, my ability to communicate with the Doctor using my mind. It was so simple, I wondered if the Doctor had figured it out. I knew he had when he saw me looking at the watches.

"I'm a Time Lord," I whispered my voice hoarse and cracked, "I'm like you."

"Yes," he said looking at the watches, "You can be. I didn't want to tell you yet, I was going to wait till you had your energy back."

"Use it."

"What?" he asked looking at me like I was crazy. I was, but so was he. How could he expect me to not say it? There were people outside dying, an energy absorbing alien coming right towards us and I could help him.

"I don't know how, I'm using all my energy just standing here and speaking. Use it. It could save me and I could save you for once Doctor. You save so many, let me save you."

Suddenly he clicked the button on top of the watch. There was a flash of bright yellow light, and my head was spinning again. But a good kind of spinning, a refreshing, new-face spinning.

And suddenly I remembered everything.

* * *

The Doctor stood, watching in awe as his companion transformed. It was, in a way, a regeneration in the sense that a regeneration is a fresh start. She kept her memories of her time with the Doctor, and growing up, but she also gained her memories of the first time she grew up on Gallifrey, looking into the Untempered Schism herself, Time Lord academy days, her travels, her companions, and her name.

Her face changed to a slightly younger Hazel, she appeared to be just older than 18 in place of her 22 year old face. She was, in fact, about 329 years old. Her eyes contained more power and certainty than Hazel's had, and her stance was more confident. She grew healthy again, her bones no longer visible beneath muscle and flesh. Something about her glowed and it wasn't the time energy from the watch. It appeared that every pore in her body gave off the air of power, strength, and confidence.

"Hazel," The Doctor breathed. But he knew that was a lie. This was an entirely different being than the strange, shy and nervous Hazel he knew.

"No," The girl spoke with an echo to it, "Hazel is gone. I take the energy from my watch, and my brother's too. I am the Alpha and the Omega. I am the Beginning, and the End. I see everything that is, that was, and that will be. I see the heart of the TARDIS and she and I are one. And I see the Maggebarian's destruction, here and now."

"NO!" The Doctor cried, "YOU CANNOT DO THAT! YOU CANNOT WIPE OUT AN ENTIRE RACE OF ALIENS!"

"Their doom is inevitable. I have seen the future if they are left to manifest here. The humans fight back, and win but to their own demise as well. The choice is yours Doctor. Let me destroy the Maggebarians once and for all, saving the human race, or sit back and watch them eat each other alive, just like you did during the Time War."

The Doctor stopped. His face hard, and cold at the memory. She had touched a nerve, one of the Doctor's weakest. And for the slightest moment, the Alpha's face changed, but then it was gone again. For the tiniest moment, it seemed as if Hazel came through, but she was gone just as fast as she had come.

"What I thought," and with that, the Alpha strode out of the TARDIS leaving the Doctor and his regrets.

* * *

The streets were in a complete state of chaos, when the Alpha stepped out. Panning the streets, she noticed in the brief time she had been gone, the Maggebarians had multiplied and spread. People were dropping into piles of bones like the fires had rained over Pompeii.

Through the quick observation the Alpha was best at, their strategy became obvious. Each was carrying a stone necklace in their hands, killing a person and allowing the energy to pass straight to the stone, making the growing speed five times faster. Clever, she thought, almost intelligent.

With a floating glide, she moved at a quick speed into the heart of the destruction. Everyone scrambled around her, no one noticing she really existed. The Doctor had stepped out of the TARDIS and was observing from afar. He knew there was nothing he could do to stop her, she had taken her own memories and strength back as well as that of the Omega. Two of the most powerful Time Lords he had ever heard of were contained in this one body, it would be too dangerous for himself and for her.

One of the Maggebarians finally caught sight of her. He raised his head and sniffed the air, sensing her power and energy from so far off. His eyes hungry with desire, he ran blindly for her, mouthwatering as he went. She grinned slightly as he came near, this was exactly what she wanted.

As he neared his arms went out before him, ready to grab and drain, but she was too fast. The second he neared, her arms moved knocking his to the side, so it was her arm around his throat. Effortlessly, she lifted him off the ground, crushing his windpipe in between her fingers. The Maggebarian, gasped and choked, with disbelief and fear plain on his face, she gave a slight grin and soon he was a pile of bones beneath her feet.

She picked up the necklace and crushed the rock between her fingers, a tingle of energy running up her hand. She hovered down the streets, finding victim after victim, not bothering to save the human bodies the alien souls had possessed.

The Doctor watched in horror and rage as he knew he could do nothing else. There was no way to stop the Alpha-Omega as there was no way to stop the Maggebarians.

As the Alpha's power grew, she became more reckless with her kills. Not even nearing the creatures she was about to destroy, merely floating past and waving her arm, laughing at each life she claimed. She did not even care if she took a human life or two, the power was starting to get to her.

She grew hungry for it, for the rush the power gave her, the feeling of it sitting in her stomach. The Alpha made one last stand, flying above the city arms spread out, ready to end it once and for all. She let out a deranged, power-mad laugh and spun in circles. Energy from Maggebarians and stones flew from their sources, piles of ash and bone dropping from where they had stood. All had been eliminated, as the Alpha only grew more powerful.

The Alpha had wiped out the entire race in under a minute, a genocide like no one had seen before. She floated down from her post above the city, laughing still. She made her way back to the TARDIS walking through walls and buildings, taking the most direct route back. The Alpha was completely mad.

The Doctor was waiting for her, disappointment and sadness on his face. She entered the clearing where the market once stood, still laughing her disturbed laugh. That was when she felt it, an extreme pain went shooting up her spine to her head, causing the most blood curdling scream to be released from her throat.

* * *

The Doctor ran to her, in panic. She collapsed on the ground, screaming like a wounded animal, but laughing at the same time. The Doctor got to her and knelt beside her, afraid to touch her in fear of what she might do.

She snapped out of her crazy state long enough for Hazel to come through. "help me Doctor, please I'm dying," Hazel said. But just as fast she was screaming and laughing again. She fell farther onto the ground writhing in pain and laughter, when the Doctor noticed the small amount of yellow light trickling from her sleeve.

She was about to regenerate.

* * *

The Doctor pulled out his sonic screw driver and did a quick scan. The energy levels were completely wrong. They were higher than the Doctor had ever seen, even for someone regenerating. The amount of energy she had absorbed was too much for even a Time Lord to handle. In order for her to be rid of the quantity she had taken she would have had to regenerate seven times more than she had enough regeneration energy for. She was going to die.

Why must Hazel always be right? He thought to himself. He thought as fast as he could. He picked her up, still squirming, and ran back to the TARDIS, her voice ringing as he ran.

Tears were running down her face as he plugged her pocket watch into the helmet and hooked her up into it. Before he could flick the switch, she snapped back into near sanity long enough to cry out, "NO PLEASE NO, DON'T SEND ME BACK PLEASE NO! I CAN'T GO BACK! NO PLEASE DON'T! PLEASE NO! I'LL BE GOOD! I WON'T HURT ANYONE! PLEASE NO!"

"I'm so sorry," The Doctor said, as he watched the last of his kind, disappear.

* * *

I woke up on the floor, my head spinning for some odd reason. I couldn't remember anything. Not my name, not my location nothing. Wait, bits are coming back to me. My name is Hazel Arthur. I am in university studying English literature and Theatre. I have an essay due tomorrow, and a job interview in the afternoon. My little brother died in a fire when I was little. I loved my little brother more than anything.

I looked up to the face of a strange man. I had never seen him before, I don't think. I looked around with curiosity and caution. I was scared and nervous, and felt incredibly uncomfortable with my surroundings. The man just stood there looking down at me. He had a look of sadness, and relief on his face. Why was that man so sad?

"Wh- Who are you? Where am I? Where's my apartment? I need to get home, I have an essay due tomorrow that I need to hand in, it's worth 30% of my final grade, and and I have a job interview at this little tea room just a block from my apartment! I'll never get that job if I'm late, and I need the job my rent is due soon along with my tuition that needs to be paid. The cost of living in London is not what it used to be! And the price of tea has gone way up, how am I supposed to get any work done if I don't have tea?"

"Hazel, Hazel. Just relax."

"How do you know my name? WHERE AM I!?" I cried beginning to get up. I regretted it when I did. The world started turning at a rapid rate before my eyes. I almost fell back down, but the mysterious man caught me. "What are you doing let go of me please! I just want to go home!" Tears had started to roll down my face.

"Hazel, it's alright, just calm down and let me explain. I'll go make some tea alright? I just need you to wait here. Alright?"

"Alright," I said still confused, "Earl Grey please, with-"

"Extra honey, I know."

I don't know how he knew but he did. He was back within minutes, two mugs in his hand. I could smell the honey from where I sat, perfect. He handed me my tea and waited till I had had a couple of sips before he began to speak.

"My name is the Doctor. I am a Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey. I am the last of my kind. You are on my ship called the TARDIS which is short for Time And Relative Dimension In Space. It's a space ship and time machine nicely packaged into one. I landed it in your bathroom in London in hopes that you might travel with me. I don't like travelling alone. We went back to ancient Rome and you saved all of human life, by destroying another alien race. We discovered that you are also a Time Lord. A very powerful and dangerous one. You absorbed all the energy of the alien race called the Maggebarians. It was too much for even your Time Lord body to handle. You would have died. I took you back here and rewrote your genetic code so you would be human again. Your Time Lord life is in this pocket watch. Guard it, but do not open it or all the energy will come back to you and kill you. It's alright if you don't believe me, and you want to go home."

He paused at that. I sat there staring into my tea, thinking for a moment. He was about to speak again but I stopped him.

"Please just give me a minute to process all this. My brain may work faster than most, but this, this is a LOT to take in."

I don't know why but he smiled at that. He smiled this big goofy, ear to ear grin that made his whole face light up. And just for that moment, all the grief and sadness was gone from him. And I don't know why, but that made me happy.

"Do you believe me Hazel?" he asked the grin still visible on his face.

"Considering that I'm still on this 'space ship time machine' thing of yours, I don't really have too much of a choice now do I?"

"Well, I mean, you could always take me for a liar, or a, well, I don't know, a-"

"A mad man with a box? Yeah I'd say that sounds right. So we went on an adventure to ancient Rome where I ended up saving all of humanity because secretly, beneath my awkwardness, I am the most powerful 'Time Lord' in existence, yeah?"

"Well, yeah, when you put it that way. Do you have any questions, or anything? I don't really know how to explain the rest."

"Yeah I have a question, all things considered, it might be dangerous out there in all of time and space. You might need a little protection from the most powerful Time Lord in existence. So my question is, where are we going next?"

"We have all of Time and Space, where would you like to go Hazel?"


	5. Alternate Ending 2

Oh shit. Sorry. You probably thought I was dead didn't you? Sorry about that, guess that was a bad place to put a chapter break. Umm shit. Please don't hate me, not dead, still alive. There's still more to my story. If I had died how would I have been able to write all this down? You guys are just being silly, but sorry about that confusion. Didn't mean it. Sorry for any tears I may have caused by my appearance of death. Sorry.

Where was I though? Yes she had touched my neck, near death, watched Petriticus, well you know…

* * *

But suddenly the hand was gone. I opened my eyes, to the clear blue sky. This must be heaven, I thought to myself. I'm dead, and I've gone to heaven. That's strange, I was convinced I'd be going to hell in several different religions. Better than nothing I suppose.

I could feel I already had my robes, I was probably waiting to get my halo and wings. Then I could fly, maybe do the whole "Angel of the Lord" shit and defeat some demons, become a hunter like in that TV show…

But wait, why was I moving? I kept catching glimpses of trees out of the corner of my eye. Was I actually still alive? Okay, ears. You got them, let's use them. I closed my eyes again and listened really closely. There was sound. There was sound! I was still alive! I heard horse hooves, and merchants shouting about their goods, and someone panting and soldiers marching! God never was I ever so happy to hear that!

Someone was panting. Why did I pick that one out? I moved my head slightly and felt dizzy again. Alright shouldn't do that, let's not move. Just feel. Close your eyes and feel.

I felt arms around my back and legs. I was being carried. Good, yes, I suppose. Unless I'm being kidnapped, not good, no. But then I heard something, that was off, something that was not normal. I could hear the heartbeat of whoever was carrying me. But it was not one beat. There were two alternating beats. That was definitely not human. Which could only mean one thing.

I heard a door open, and feet on a metal grate. Soon I was being laid down on the floor. I opened my eyes again, and saw the Doctor looking down at me with concern on his face but relief in his eyes.

"I… I told… her… you… saved… people…" I managed to squeak out. I couldn't say much else, so I just smiled as best as I could. He smiled back with a little chuckle of relief. I felt so small just lying there, like a child again. _I'm so tired._ I thought to myself. I did not expect a reply,_ I know. _he said, well, thought. _You can't sleep, I need you to promise me that. Don't sleep._

"OK" I said but the rest was dark.

* * *

The Doctor started scrambling around the TARDIS's console again. The girl lying on the floor hardly looked more than skin and bones. Her joints protruding at seemingly strange angles, each rib could be counted, her organs appeared to have evaporated, her short hair clung lifelessly to her scalp that was almost her skull.

A wave of relief had washed over him, when he had seen her still alive, but looking at her now he knew he had just barely saved her. He had come just as he saw her bending down to touch her. The touch of death. The touch that was going to suck every drop of energy out of her, but he managed to stop it.

He had run over just in time, and scrambled her thoughts with his sonic just enough to push her out of his way, and get to Hazel. He took her pulse gently and knew she was still alive, so he could spend a small amount of time dealing with the Maggebarian. He tied her to a tree and hit her with another blast from the sonic, but he knew that wouldn't last too long. He lifted Hazel gently in his arms, and started running as fast as he dared.

He was in the TARDIS now, and she was safe, not for very long, but for now. Part of him wanted to share his time energy with her so she can heal faster, but he knew she was still human and it could kill her. He was not willing to take that risk.

He ran to the kitchen room and found some honey, and tea. She was from London, of course this would help. He ran back and fed her small amounts of honey, so she could start getting her energy back. He left the tea beside her so she could just smell it and feel the warmth from the cup.

"Hazel, I know right now you're not well but I'm going to tell you what happened. That girl who was with you was the first of the eggs to hatch. She was probably left to die in the tunnel and a hatched egg found her. She had been trying to escape since. That could've been months ago. When you came along she was just planning on killing you right away, but I had sent out my thoughts to you and she used that. Those eggs absorb energy of all kinds. The TARDIS and me are full of energy, so I've placed the egg in a concrete box. While it is still just a ball of energy looking for a host, that should stop it. But not for long. I'm looking for a permanent way to stop them right now. I'm so sorry Hazel, I should not have let you do that. How stupid could I have been? I'm so sorry."

And the Doctor started crying. Hazel didn't know why he was. She did not know he almost lost the only other person that is like him. She did not know what she was, and she wasn't even 100% sure what he was. Seeing him cry though gave her enough strength to stand up. She managed to walk over to him and wipe it away.

Seeing him cry like that was more painful than her physical injuries. Because something she did know, was the Doctor had lost before. He had lost many more than she could even imagine. She knew the pain of watching her brother die and knowing she could do nothing more than send him on his way peacefully. But even more she knew that Doctor had done that a thousand times more.

For the first time, his 900 years really showed, and she knew life was more painful and harder than death. And she wondered why he did it. Why he kept living and losing everyone he loved when it would have been easier to die.

* * *

She was in his memories again. She watched the 8 year old Doctor walk forward towards the Gallifreyan elders. They directed him up the steps where the mighty untempered schism stood. And she watched from above as he looked into it.

Tears were rolling down his face, as he looked on into the void of time and space. She knew he was slowly going a bit mad, and he wanted to run, but something kept him looking on. She figured out what it was just as the young boy turned and ran. And he didn't stop running.

* * *

"Sorry-" I creaked out sitting down again against the railings. He walked over to me, no more tears, not even the hint that he had been crying. He spooned some more honey into my mouth and gave me some water.

"No," he spoke to me gently, "Don't be sorry. You've helped me so much. Thank you. Sometimes, I need to remember why I'm still here."

He got up and started pressing buttons again. The TARDIS door must have been left open a crack because from nowhere there was a sudden burst of screaming. The Doctor ran over and peered outside. He ran back to the control panel and started pressing things.

"Right then, so your friend seems to have escaped and is now terrorizing Rome. People are dropping dead left, right, and centre and I still don't know how to stop it. Alright, conduct energy, we could use rubber but this is ancient Rome there is no rubber and won't be for another Century. My shoes, yes but I cannot encase her in my shoes. OH come on think! AHHHH" he screamed at himself as he ran his fingers through his hair.

I spooned some more honey into my mouth, and noticed something that had not been there before. On the control panel sat a pocket watch. My pocket watch. It was clean now and not coated in rust. I walked over to it, and looked at the strange symbols on it. They were familiar to me in a strange and eerie way. I took out mine and found similar markings on it. But mine was different.

I remembered where I had seen them before. Inside the Doctor's memory, all around the Schism were markings just like these ones. Even in my weakened state it took me no time to put the pieces together. All these strange quirks, my fast thought process, my ability to communicate with the Doctor using my mind. It was so simple, I wondered if the Doctor had figured it out. I knew he had when he saw me looking at the watches.

"I'm a Time Lord," I whispered my voice hoarse and cracked, "I'm like you."

"Yes," he said looking at the watches, "You can be. I didn't want to tell you yet, I was going to wait till you had your energy back."

"Use it."

"What?" he asked looking at me like I was crazy. I was, but so was he. How could he expect me to not say it? There were people outside dying, an energy absorbing alien coming right towards us and I could help him.

"I don't know how, I'm using all my energy just standing here and speaking. Use it. It could save me and I could save you for once Doctor. You save so many, let me save you."

Suddenly he clicked the button on top of the watch. There was a flash of bright yellow light, and my head was spinning again. But a good kind of spinning, a refreshing, new-face spinning.

And suddenly I remembered everything.

* * *

The Doctor stood, watching in awe as his companion transformed. It was, in a way, a regeneration in the sense that a regeneration is a fresh start. She kept her memories of her time with the Doctor, and growing up, but she also gained her memories of the first time she grew up on Gallifrey, looking into the Untempered Schism herself, Time Lord academy days, her travels, her companions, and her name.

Her face changed to a slightly younger Hazel, she appeared to be just older than 18 in place of her 22 year old face. She was, in fact, about 329 years old. Her eyes contained more power and certainty than Hazel's had, and her stance was more confident. She grew healthy again, her bones no longer visible beneath muscle and flesh. Something about her glowed and it wasn't the time energy from the watch. It appeared that every pore in her body gave off the air of power, strength, and confidence.

"Hazel," The Doctor breathed. But he knew that was a lie. This was an entirely different being than the strange, shy and nervous Hazel he knew.

"No," The girl spoke with an echo to it, "Hazel is gone. I take the energy from my watch, and my brother's too. I am the Alpha and the Omega. I am the Beginning, and the End. I see everything that is, that was, and that will be. I see the heart of the TARDIS and she and I are one. And I see the Maggebarian's destruction, here and now."

"NO!" The Doctor cried, "YOU CANNOT DO THAT! YOU CANNOT WIPE OUT AN ENTIRE RACE OF ALIENS!"

"Their doom is inevitable. I have seen the future if they are left to manifest here. The humans fight back, and win but to their own demise as well. The choice is yours Doctor. Let me destroy the Maggebarians once and for all, saving the human race, or sit back and watch them eat each other alive, just like you did during the Time War."

The Doctor stopped. His face hard, and cold at the memory. She had touched a nerve, one of the Doctor's weakest. And for the slightest moment, the Alpha's face changed, but then it was gone again. For the tiniest moment, it seemed as if Hazel came through, but she was gone just as fast as she had come.

"What I thought," and with that, the Alpha strode out of the TARDIS leaving the Doctor and his regrets.

* * *

The streets were in a complete state of chaos, when the Alpha stepped out. Panning the streets, she noticed in the brief time she had been gone, the Maggebarians had multiplied and spread. People were dropping into piles of bones like the fires had rained over Pompeii.

Through the quick observation the Alpha was best at, their strategy became obvious. Each was carrying a stone necklace in their hands, killing a person and allowing the energy to pass straight to the stone, making the growing speed five times faster. Clever, she thought, almost intelligent.

With a floating glide, she moved at a quick speed into the heart of the destruction. Everyone scrambled around her, no one noticing she really existed. The Doctor had stepped out of the TARDIS and was observing from afar. He knew there was nothing he could do to stop her, she had taken her own memories and strength back as well as that of the Omega. Two of the most powerful Time Lords he had ever heard of were contained in this one body, it would be too dangerous for himself and for her.

One of the Maggebarians finally caught sight of her. He raised his head and sniffed the air, sensing her power and energy from so far off. His eyes hungry with desire, he ran blindly for her, mouthwatering as he went. She grinned slightly as he came near, this was exactly what she wanted.

As he neared his arms went out before him, ready to grab and drain, but she was too fast. The second he neared, her arms moved knocking his to the side, so it was her arm around his throat. Effortlessly, she lifted him off the ground, crushing his windpipe in between her fingers. The Maggebarian, gasped and choked, with disbelief and fear plain on his face, she gave a slight grin and soon he was a pile of bones beneath her feet.

She picked up the necklace and crushed the rock between her fingers, a tingle of energy running up her hand. She hovered down the streets, finding victim after victim, not bothering to save the human bodies the alien souls had possessed.

The Doctor watched in horror and rage as he knew he could do nothing else. There was no way to stop the Alpha-Omega as there was no way to stop the Maggebarians.

As the Alpha's power grew, she became more reckless with her kills. Not even nearing the creatures she was about to destroy, merely floating past and waving her arm, laughing at each life she claimed. She did not even care if she took a human life or two, the power was starting to get to her.

She grew hungry for it, for the rush the power gave her, the feeling of it sitting in her stomach. The Alpha made one last stand, flying above the city arms spread out, ready to end it once and for all. She let out a deranged, power-mad laugh and spun in circles. Energy from Maggebarians and stones flew from their sources, piles of ash and bone dropping from where they had stood. All had been eliminated, as the Alpha only grew more powerful.

The Alpha had wiped out the entire race in under a minute, a genocide like no one had seen before. She floated down from her post above the city, laughing still. She made her way back to the TARDIS walking through walls and buildings, taking the most direct route back. The Alpha was completely mad.

The Doctor was waiting for her, disappointment and sadness on his face. She entered the clearing where the market once stood, still laughing her disturbed laugh. That was when she felt it, an extreme pain went shooting up her spine to her head, causing the most blood curdling scream to be released from her throat.

The Doctor ran to her, in panic. She collapsed on the ground, screaming like a wounded animal, but laughing at the same time. The Doctor got to her and knelt beside her, afraid to touch her in fear of what she might do.

She snapped out of her crazy state long enough for Hazel to come through. "help me Doctor, please I'm dying," Hazel said. But just as fast she was screaming and laughing again. She fell farther onto the ground writhing in pain and laughter, when the Doctor noticed the small amount of yellow light trickling from her sleeve.

She was about to regenerate.

* * *

The Doctor pulled out his sonic screw driver and did a quick scan. The energy levels were completely wrong. They were higher than the Doctor had ever seen, even for someone regenerating. The amount of energy she had absorbed was too much for even a Time Lord to handle. In order for her to be rid of the quantity she had taken she would have had to regenerate seven times more than she had enough regeneration energy for. She was going to die.

_Why must Hazel always be right? _He thought to himself. He thought as fast as he could. He picked her up, still squirming, and ran back to the TARDIS, her voice ringing as he ran.

Tears were running down her face as he plugged her pocket watch into the helmet and hooked her up into it. Before he could flick the switch, she snapped back into near sanity long enough to cry out, "NO PLEASE NO, DON'T SEND ME BACK PLEASE NO! I CAN'T GO BACK! NO PLEASE DON'T! PLEASE NO! I'LL BE GOOD! I WON'T HURT ANYONE! PLEASE NO!"

"I'm so sorry," The Doctor said, as he watched the last of his kind, disappear.

* * *

I woke up in my bed the next morning, feeling more tired and exhausted than ever before. I felt hung over but without the fun of drinking the previous night. God, why was I so tired?

I rolled over onto my other side to take a look at my alarm clock. 10:00am. 10:00am! Shit I was going to be late for my class! I scrambled out of bed, stripping as I ran to the bathroom.

I jumped in the shower as fast as I could, quickly rinsed off the feeling of sleep, hopped out and attempted to comb my hair and brush my teeth simultaneously. I failed. My hair ended up in some kind of attempt at a pony tail (my hair being too short for an actual pony tail), as tooth paste ran down my front.

Running back to my room, I threw on clothes that smelled alright. I probably wore them yesterday, but who cares? No attractive people to impress, and I'm really in no mood to impress myself. I was going to have to run home and change for the interview anyways, so it's not like it mattered too much.

I threw my lap top into my bag (well not threw, but you understand what I meant), ran to the kitchen and made myself a cup of tea. During my rush I didn't even notice that the kettle was already boiled, and my favourite tea and honey already on the counter. Probably just left them out last night.

Just before I could run out, there were five knocks on my door. This is just what I needed, a delay when I'm already late.

I opened the door to a gentleman in his mid-40's. He was a tall bloke, a bit scrawny, with amazing hair and for some reason was wearing a blue suit and trench coat in the middle of summer. He wasn't too bad on the eyes, but not overly attractive.

"Hello!" he said with a goofy ear to ear grin on his face. He looked like a little kid who was excited about his first day of school.

"Hi," I said tentatively, "Can I help you with something?"

"Oh, no, I'm just , uh, your new neighbor! Wanted to introduce myself, my names John Smith." He did a little hop thingy on his toes, and stuck out his hand. I took it, and shook it slowly. The man seemed a bit off.

"Hazel. Pleasure. I'm sorry Mr. Smith but-"

"Oh please call me John, Mr. Smith's my father. Besides I don't even go my Mr. either."

"Alright, John then. I'm in a bit of a hurry, I'd love to stay and chat but I can't. Maybe we could have tea or something later, but not right now," I pushed past him closing the door behind me and locking it. I started to walk away, but stopped, spun on my heel and asked "If you don't go by Mister, then what do you go by?"

"Oh, well, people normally just call me The Doctor."


	6. Alternate Ending 3

Oh shit. Sorry. You probably thought I was dead didn't you? Sorry about that, guess that was a bad place to put a chapter break. Umm shit. Please don't hate me, not dead, still alive. There's still more to my story. If I had died how would I have been able to write all this down? You guys are just being silly, but sorry about that confusion. Didn't mean it. Sorry for any tears I may have caused by my appearance of death. Sorry.

Where was I though? Yes she had touched my neck, near death, watched Petriticus, well you know…

* * *

But suddenly the hand was gone. I opened my eyes, to the clear blue sky. This must be heaven, I thought to myself. I'm dead, and I've gone to heaven. That's strange, I was convinced I'd be going to hell in several different religions. Better than nothing I suppose.

I could feel I already had my robes, I was probably waiting to get my halo and wings. Then I could fly, maybe do the whole "Angel of the Lord" shit and defeat some demons, become a hunter like in that TV show…

But wait, why was I moving? I kept catching glimpses of trees out of the corner of my eye. Was I actually still alive? Okay, ears. You got them, let's use them. I closed my eyes again and listened really closely. There was sound. There was sound! I was still alive! I heard horse hooves, and merchants shouting about their goods, and someone panting and soldiers marching! God never was I ever so happy to hear that!

Someone was panting. Why did I pick that one out? I moved my head slightly and felt dizzy again. Alright shouldn't do that, let's not move. Just feel. Close your eyes and feel.

I felt arms around my back and legs. I was being carried. Good, yes, I suppose. Unless I'm being kidnapped, not good, no. But then I heard something, that was off, something that was not normal. I could hear the heartbeat of whoever was carrying me. But it was not one beat. There were two alternating beats. That was definitely not human. Which could only mean one thing.

I heard a door open, and feet on a metal grate. Soon I was being laid down on the floor. I opened my eyes again, and saw the Doctor looking down at me with concern on his face but relief in his eyes.

"I… I told… her… you… saved… people…" I managed to squeak out. I couldn't say much else, so I just smiled as best as I could. He smiled back with a little chuckle of relief. I felt so small just lying there, like a child again. _I'm so tired._ I thought to myself. I did not expect a reply,_ I know. _he said, well, thought. _You can't sleep, I need you to promise me that. Don't sleep._

"OK" I said but the rest was dark.

* * *

The Doctor started scrambling around the TARDIS's console again. The girl lying on the floor hardly looked more than skin and bones. Her joints protruding at seemingly strange angles, each rib could be counted, her organs appeared to have evaporated, her short hair clung lifelessly to her scalp that was almost her skull.

A wave of relief had washed over him, when he had seen her still alive, but looking at her now he knew he had just barely saved her. He had come just as he saw her bending down to touch her. The touch of death. The touch that was going to suck every drop of energy out of her, but he managed to stop it.

He had run over just in time, and scrambled her thoughts with his sonic just enough to push her out of his way, and get to Hazel. He took her pulse gently and knew she was still alive, so he could spend a small amount of time dealing with the Maggebarian. He tied her to a tree and hit her with another blast from the sonic, but he knew that wouldn't last too long. He lifted Hazel gently in his arms, and started running as fast as he dared.

He was in the TARDIS now, and she was safe, not for very long, but for now. Part of him wanted to share his time energy with her so she can heal faster, but he knew she was still human and it could kill her. He was not willing to take that risk.

He ran to the kitchen room and found some honey, and tea. She was from London, of course this would help. He ran back and fed her small amounts of honey, so she could start getting her energy back. He left the tea beside her so she could just smell it and feel the warmth from the cup.

"Hazel, I know right now you're not well but I'm going to tell you what happened. That girl who was with you was the first of the eggs to hatch. She was probably left to die in the tunnel and a hatched egg found her. She had been trying to escape since. That could've been months ago. When you came along she was just planning on killing you right away, but I had sent out my thoughts to you and she used that. Those eggs absorb energy of all kinds. The TARDIS and me are full of energy, so I've placed the egg in a concrete box. While it is still just a ball of energy looking for a host, that should stop it. But not for long. I'm looking for a permanent way to stop them right now. I'm so sorry Hazel, I should not have let you do that. How stupid could I have been? I'm so sorry."

And the Doctor started crying. Hazel didn't know why he was. She did not know he almost lost the only other person that is like him. She did not know what she was, and she wasn't even 100% sure what he was. Seeing him cry though gave her enough strength to stand up. She managed to walk over to him and wipe it away.

Seeing him cry like that was more painful than her physical injuries. Because something she did know, was the Doctor had lost before. He had lost many more than she could even imagine. She knew the pain of watching her brother die and knowing she could do nothing more than send him on his way peacefully. But even more she knew that Doctor had done that a thousand times more.

For the first time, his 900 years really showed, and she knew life was more painful and harder than death. And she wondered why he did it. Why he kept living and losing everyone he loved when it would have been easier to die.

* * *

She was in his memories again. She watched the 8 year old Doctor walk forward towards the Gallifreyan elders. They directed him up the steps where the mighty untempered schism stood. And she watched from above as he looked into it.

Tears were rolling down his face, as he looked on into the void of time and space. She knew he was slowly going a bit mad, and he wanted to run, but something kept him looking on. She figured out what it was just as the young boy turned and ran. And he didn't stop running.

* * *

"Sorry-" I creaked out sitting down again against the railings. He walked over to me, no more tears, not even the hint that he had been crying. He spooned some more honey into my mouth and gave me some water.

"No," he spoke to me gently, "Don't be sorry. You've helped me so much. Thank you. Sometimes, I need to remember why I'm still here."

He got up and started pressing buttons again. The TARDIS door must have been left open a crack because from nowhere there was a sudden burst of screaming. The Doctor ran over and peered outside. He ran back to the control panel and started pressing things.

"Right then, so your friend seems to have escaped and is now terrorizing Rome. People are dropping dead left, right, and centre and I still don't know how to stop it. Alright, conduct energy, we could use rubber but this is ancient Rome there is no rubber and won't be for another Century. My shoes, yes but I cannot encase her in my shoes. OH come on think! AHHHH" he screamed at himself as he ran his fingers through his hair.

I spooned some more honey into my mouth, and noticed something that had not been there before. On the control panel sat a pocket watch. My pocket watch. It was clean now and not coated in rust. I walked over to it, and looked at the strange symbols on it. They were familiar to me in a strange and eerie way. I took out mine and found similar markings on it. But mine was different.

I remembered where I had seen them before. Inside the Doctor's memory, all around the Schism were markings just like these ones. Even in my weakened state it took me no time to put the pieces together. All these strange quirks, my fast thought process, my ability to communicate with the Doctor using my mind. It was so simple, I wondered if the Doctor had figured it out. I knew he had when he saw me looking at the watches.

"I'm a Time Lord," I whispered my voice hoarse and cracked, "I'm like you."

"Yes," he said looking at the watches, "You can be. I didn't want to tell you yet, I was going to wait till you had your energy back."

"Use it."

"What?" he asked looking at me like I was crazy. I was, but so was he. How could he expect me to not say it? There were people outside dying, an energy absorbing alien coming right towards us and I could help him.

"I don't know how, I'm using all my energy just standing here and speaking. Use it. It could save me and I could save you for once Doctor. You save so many, let me save you."

Suddenly he clicked the button on top of the watch. There was a flash of bright yellow light, and my head was spinning again. But a good kind of spinning, a refreshing, new-face spinning.

And suddenly I remembered everything.

* * *

The Doctor stood, watching in awe as his companion transformed. It was, in a way, a regeneration in the sense that a regeneration is a fresh start. She kept her memories of her time with the Doctor, and growing up, but she also gained her memories of the first time she grew up on Gallifrey, looking into the Untempered Schism herself, Time Lord academy days, her travels, her companions, and her name.

Her face changed to a slightly younger Hazel, she appeared to be just older than 18 in place of her 22 year old face. She was, in fact, about 329 years old. Her eyes contained more power and certainty than Hazel's had, and her stance was more confident. She grew healthy again, her bones no longer visible beneath muscle and flesh. Something about her glowed and it wasn't the time energy from the watch. It appeared that every pore in her body gave off the air of power, strength, and confidence.

"Hazel," The Doctor breathed. But he knew that was a lie. This was an entirely different being than the strange, shy and nervous Hazel he knew.

"No," The girl spoke with an echo to it, "Hazel is gone. I take the energy from my watch, and my brother's too. I am the Alpha and the Omega. I am the Beginning, and the End. I see everything that is, that was, and that will be. I see the heart of the TARDIS and she and I are one. And I see the Maggebarian's destruction, here and now."

"NO!" The Doctor cried, "YOU CANNOT DO THAT! YOU CANNOT WIPE OUT AN ENTIRE RACE OF ALIENS!"

"Their doom is inevitable. I have seen the future if they are left to manifest here. The humans fight back, and win but to their own demise as well. The choice is yours Doctor. Let me destroy the Maggebarians once and for all, saving the human race, or sit back and watch them eat each other alive, just like you did during the Time War."

The Doctor stopped. His face hard, and cold at the memory. She had touched a nerve, one of the Doctor's weakest. And for the slightest moment, the Alpha's face changed, but then it was gone again. For the tiniest moment, it seemed as if Hazel came through, but she was gone just as fast as she had come.

"What I thought," and with that, the Alpha strode out of the TARDIS leaving the Doctor and his regrets.

* * *

The streets were in a complete state of chaos, when the Alpha stepped out. Panning the streets, she noticed in the brief time she had been gone, the Maggebarians had multiplied and spread. People were dropping into piles of bones like the fires had rained over Pompeii.

Through the quick observation the Alpha was best at, their strategy became obvious. Each was carrying a stone necklace in their hands, killing a person and allowing the energy to pass straight to the stone, making the growing speed five times faster. Clever, she thought, almost intelligent.

With a floating glide, she moved at a quick speed into the heart of the destruction. Everyone scrambled around her, no one noticing she really existed. The Doctor had stepped out of the TARDIS and was observing from afar. He knew there was nothing he could do to stop her, she had taken her own memories and strength back as well as that of the Omega. Two of the most powerful Time Lords he had ever heard of were contained in this one body, it would be too dangerous for himself and for her.

One of the Maggebarians finally caught sight of her. He raised his head and sniffed the air, sensing her power and energy from so far off. His eyes hungry with desire, he ran blindly for her, mouthwatering as he went. She grinned slightly as he came near, this was exactly what she wanted.

As he neared his arms went out before him, ready to grab and drain, but she was too fast. The second he neared, her arms moved knocking his to the side, so it was her arm around his throat. Effortlessly, she lifted him off the ground, crushing his windpipe in between her fingers. The Maggebarian, gasped and choked, with disbelief and fear plain on his face, she gave a slight grin and soon he was a pile of bones beneath her feet.

She picked up the necklace and crushed the rock between her fingers, a tingle of energy running up her hand. She hovered down the streets, finding victim after victim, not bothering to save the human bodies the alien souls had possessed.

The Doctor watched in horror and rage as he knew he could do nothing else. There was no way to stop the Alpha-Omega as there was no way to stop the Maggebarians.

As the Alpha's power grew, she became more reckless with her kills. Not even nearing the creatures she was about to destroy, merely floating past and waving her arm, laughing at each life she claimed. She did not even care if she took a human life or two, the power was starting to get to her.

She grew hungry for it, for the rush the power gave her, the feeling of it sitting in her stomach. The Alpha made one last stand, flying above the city arms spread out, ready to end it once and for all. She let out a deranged, power-mad laugh and spun in circles. Energy from Maggebarians and stones flew from their sources, piles of ash and bone dropping from where they had stood. All had been eliminated, as the Alpha only grew more powerful.

The Alpha had wiped out the entire race in under a minute, a genocide like no one had seen before. She floated down from her post above the city, laughing still. She made her way back to the TARDIS walking through walls and buildings, taking the most direct route back. The Alpha was completely mad.

The Doctor was waiting for her, disappointment and sadness on his face. She entered the clearing where the market once stood, still laughing her disturbed laugh. That was when she felt it, an extreme pain went shooting up her spine to her head, causing the most blood curdling scream to be released from her throat.

The Doctor ran to her, in panic. She collapsed on the ground, screaming like a wounded animal, but laughing at the same time. The Doctor got to her and knelt beside her, afraid to touch her in fear of what she might do.

She snapped out of her crazy state long enough for Hazel to come through. "help me Doctor, please I'm dying," Hazel said. But just as fast she was screaming and laughing again. She fell farther onto the ground writhing in pain and laughter, when the Doctor noticed the small amount of yellow light trickling from her sleeve.

She was about to regenerate.

* * *

The Doctor pulled out his sonic screw driver and did a quick scan. The energy levels were completely wrong. They were higher than the Doctor had ever seen, even for someone regenerating. The amount of energy she had absorbed was too much for even a Time Lord to handle. In order for her to be rid of the quantity she had taken she would have had to regenerate seven times more than she had enough regeneration energy for. She was going to die.

_Why must Hazel always be right? _He thought to himself. He thought as fast as he could. He picked her up, still squirming, and ran back to the TARDIS, her voice ringing as he ran.

Tears were running down her face as he plugged her pocket watch into the helmet and hooked her up into it. Before he could flick the switch, she snapped back into near sanity long enough to cry out, "NO PLEASE NO, DON'T SEND ME BACK PLEASE NO! I CAN'T GO BACK! NO PLEASE DON'T! PLEASE NO! I'LL BE GOOD! I WON'T HURT ANYONE! PLEASE NO!"

"I'm so sorry," The Doctor said, as he watched the last of his kind, disappear.

* * *

I woke up in my bed the next morning, feeling more tired and exhausted than ever before. I felt hung over but without the fun of drinking the previous night. God, why was I so tired?

I got out of bed, despite my bodies numerous protests, slipped on my bunny slippers and went to make myself some tea. I checked the time on my microwave. 6:42am. That's why I was so damn tired, I should still be asleep. Too late, I'm already up.

I took my dear sweet time getting ready. Scrambled myself some eggs, had two cups of tea instead of one, took an extra-long shower and picked out some actually clean clothes to wear for the day (which was surprisingly difficult seeing as I hadn't done laundry in two weeks). I vowed to do laundry when I got home, but knew that it probably wasn't going to happen.

I got dressed, read over my paper one more time, made some last minute adjustments, and realized it was still only 8:30am. I remembered what I had dreamt last night to the best of my ability and wrote it on my blog, like my therapist had told me.

See, I keep having these reoccurring dreams about this strange man with this blue box…


End file.
